In a release, the Republican officials said they would not rest until they knew:

• Why are we sending these jobs overseas when Boeing has a proven record of building Tankers?

• Why did the Air Force choose a less-efficient aircraft that is harder to maneuver?

• Why did the Air Force award this contract to a company that has never built a Tanker in its history?

• Why would the Air Force outsource a contract so critical to the security of our nation to a foreign company that is highly subsidized by European governments?

I think US military contracts should always go to the best companies that make the best product.

Damn I hate to say this but on certain points I agree with BOTH Id, and Bent (forgive me Snoop, for I have sinned ). Here's what I want: The best equipped Fighting Forces for the least amount of taxpayer expense. If that means contracting to another FRIENDLY Foriegn Nation, so be it, but b]you bet your bottom dollar I want oversight, so figure that into your contract price. It all seems pretty simple to me. If the, other countries want to bid, fine include in your price, the oversight costs.

In my country we still just hook the donkey to the cart and send it down the road.

You’re saying McCain was on the take – trying to get money from NG/EADS in exchange for political favors that would get them the contract. VERY SERIOUS charges – ya need to back that up with more than some nutjjob’s blog. If true, he needs to go to prison and obviously the democrats win the White House. Wonder why Clinton or Obama’s people don’t’ know about this….

With a charge this serious if ya got no facts from trusted sources it is irresponsible to say it.

End EADS illegal subsidies

We have certainly come a long way from the days of "freedom fries." It wasn't long ago that France was leading the charge against our foreign policy, stirring up anti-American feelings throughout Europe. Yet, with a new French president extolling American values and even vacationing in New Hampshire, it seems the American public and our leaders are beginning to actually take a shine to the home of the croissant and the Declaration of the Rights of Man.

However, in terms of real policy, not much has changed. Though its top officials have promised to help, France has yet to send any troops to help American forces quell violent insurgents in Iraq. And U.S. and French trade officials continue to clash over agricultural subsidies, with French farmers receiving the lion's share of massive European Union subsidies. Serious issues still divide the U.S. and France; and the recent rapprochement unfortunately hasn't proceeded further than mere rhetoric.

Case in point is a historic trade lawsuit pending before the World Trade Organization, which pits the United States against the European Union and French aerospace manufacturer EADS/Airbus. At issue are more than $100 billion in subsidies that European Union member countries doled out to EADS/Airbus in order to launch the company's line of commercial jetliners. These subsidies, which violate international trade laws, allowed EADS/Airbus to skyrocket from a rookie company in the commercial jetliner business to capturing more than 50 percent of the global market in record time, causing thousands of American workers to lose their jobs.

An impressive group of elected officials from both sides of the aisle and most of the top U.S. editorial boards have condemned these subsidies; still, the EU and EADS have refused to end the subsidies program. In fact, while U.S. lawyers continue to prosecute the EADS/Airbus' subsidies before the WTO, back home in the U.S., the French company is competing for a $40 billion defense contract to construct our new fleet of aerial tanker refueling aircraft. And, in a startling act of defiance, EADS has based its tanker aircraft on one of the same commercial jetliners that were heavily subsidized by the European Union. To make matters even worse, EADS would move tens of thousands of U.S. manufacturing jobs to France if it wins the tanker contract over its American competitor Boeing.

It's critical that the Air Force get the best tanker plane possible. Experts disagree about which plane is the best, though most side with Boeing because of its proven design and more versatile size. However, the federal government should never purchase services or products that have been developed through illegal means.

Strangely, EADS has succeeded in convincing the Department of Defense to ignore these illegal subsidies when it comes to evaluating bids for the tanker contract.

If this new French administration is really serious about American values, they should begin with the virtue of fair competition. President Sarkozy should end EADS' illegal subsidies program and force the company to divest itself of the $100 billion in free money that has enabled EADS to unfairly undercut American manufacturers. We cannot afford to hand our most prized defense contracts to companies that violate international law and seek to erode our economy.

Why then was Airbus/Northrop even allowed to bid?

Good question.

Although Mr. McCain says he moved to the sidelines, some of his top supporters were heavily involved in lobbying for EADS. The tanker deal could grow to $100 billion, making it one of the biggest Pentagon purchases ever, and the jousting for it involved extremely intensive and expensive industry lobbying on both sides.

Mr. McCain’s campaign co-chairman, former Representative Thomas Loeffler, a Texas Republican, also runs a lobbying firm, the Loeffler Group, which earned $220,000 working for EADS in 2007. Mr. Loeffler was the McCain campaign national finance chairman when his firm was hired to lobby for EADS.

Two other Loeffler executives who were registered to lobby for EADS are now top campaign advisers for Mr. McCain, Susan Nelson, the finance director, and former Navy Secretary William L. Ball III. Ms. Nelson and Mr. Ball left the lobbying firm to join the campaign.

Another major money raiser for Mr. McCain, Wayne Berman, who was named vice chairman of the campaign last year, also worked for EADS through another lobbying firm, Ogilvy Government Relations, where he is a partner. Ogilvy earned $240,000 from EADS in 2007.

Also supporting Mr. McCain and lobbying on behalf of EADS was Kirk Blalock, a national chairman of Young Professionals for McCain and former aide to President Bush. Mr. Blalock’s lobbying firm, Fierce, Isakowitz & Blalock, earned $320,000 from EADS in 2007, according to disclosure forms required by Congress.

Boeing Protest Halts USAF Tanker Work

Mar 12, 2008




By Amy Butler

Boeing's protest of the U.S. Air Force's selection of a Northrop Grumman/EADS North America design for its $35 billion KC-135 replacement was filed March 11 with congressional referees at the Government Accountability Office.

The protest procedure requires the Air Force to issue an immediate stop-work order and discontinue communications with the Northrop/EADS team pending either the issuance of an Air Force waiver deeming the work essential to national security or a ruling from the GAO.

The GAO has 100 days to decide whether the Air Force followed proper procurement processes leading to its selection of an Airbus A330 design for its future aerial refueling tanker.

...

The Air Force unfairly altered its assessment of how the Boeing's 767-based model and the Northrop/EADS aircraft would operate in "real world" scenarios, said Mark McGraw, vice president of Boeing's tanker programs. The company's ratings on this evaluation criteria factor, the so-called "Factor 5," were switched multiple times leading up to the final selection of the Northrop design, he told reporters during a March 11 teleconference.

In one instance, the Air Force actually amended its computer model for this factor to "accommodate" the larger aircraft. For example, the Air Force allowed the larger A330s to be parked closer together than originally planned, inflated the thickness of runways in the computer model (though not actually doing so in the field), and added some ramp and hangar space (in computer models, not in the field) to allow for the larger footprint of the Northrop/EADS offer.

The Air Force "disconnected the whole assessment from the real-world studies" the service had previously created leading up to the KC-X competition. Furthermore, the service didn't take into account the cost of adding the ramp space and beefing up the runways to accommodate the A330 during its evaluation, McGraw says.

Lockheed Team Wins Redesign Of Marine One
For Sikorsky, Loss of Contract Also Symbolizes Slip in Prestige

By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 29, 2005; Page E01

Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. -- maker of the president's helicopter since the Eisenhower administration -- lost its parking spot on the White House lawn yesterday.

Ending a bitterly contested battle, the Navy chose an international team led by Lockheed Martin Corp. to build a new version of the helicopter, roiling congressional critics intent on protecting American jobs and prestige.

"This competition is about making sure that 'Made in America' still means something," said Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro (D-Conn.), home of thousands of Sikorsky jobs. "What kind of statement do we make to the American worker if we outsource Marine One? It is one of the most enduring symbols of our country, now tarnished."

Sikorsky's chief executive had called the $6 billion program a "must win" and -- along with Lockheed -- conducted one of the most public and bruising battles for a military contract in years.

Lockheed is using a helicopter designed by AgustaWestland, a unit of the Italian defense firm Finmeccanica SpA. Critics complained that the president should be flown only in an American aircraft, and Sikorsky, a unit of Connecticut-based United Technologies Corp., even dumped its foreign contractors, including companies from Taiwan and Japan, arguing that only an all-American team could ensure the president's safety.

Sixty-five percent of Lockheed's aircraft will be built in the United States; the transmission will be built in Italy and the blades in the United Kingdom.

The Navy said the Lockheed helicopter would meet its needs more quickly and on budget...

Cost Nearly Doubles For Marine One Fleet
Production of Craft Has Been Delayed

By Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 17, 2008; Page A01

A year after Sept. 11, 2001, the White House set out to build a fleet of state-of-the-art Marine One helicopters for the al-Qaeda age that would be safer, more powerful and more reliable than the iconic white-topped aircraft that have landed on the South Lawn for decades.

But the al-Qaeda age has met the military acquisition process. Six years later, the cost of the new helicopters has nearly doubled, production has fallen behind schedule, and the bulk of the program has been put on hold while the government tries to figure out how to salvage it.

The Pentagon confirmed this month that the cost of the fleet of 28 new super-sophisticated helicopters has jumped from $6.1 billion when the contract was signed in 2005 to $11.2 billion today.

...

Then-White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. grew aggravated with the aging fleet's problems in 2002, and he launched the effort to develop a new model with a post-Sept. 11 upgrade. Although Lockheed Martin does not make helicopters, the Navy chose it over longtime contractor Sikorsky Aircraft because the company's European partner had a three-engine model that seemed a logical off-the-shelf base for a new presidential helicopter. But modifying the EH101 has proven so complicated that the company is essentially building a new helicopter.

The first five helicopters are due in 2010, a year behind schedule, although the White House made compromises on the requirements to cut costs and speed delivery. Twenty-three more-sophisticated versions are to follow, at which point the current fleet and the first five craft would be retired. But the most recent target date of 2015 for these additional choppers has slipped to an unknown date.

The problems with the second batch have prompted the Pentagon to issue a stop-work order until it determines what to do and Congress provides more money.

Are you suggesting the NG/EADS team might do the same on the tanker (overrun cost, not deliver), but Boeing would not?

Ok, maybe, any data to support that?

If we were arguing about a fleet of cars for the government and it was Toyota vs. Ford, would you still say we should only "buy American" even if the Toyota car was clearly better?

And let's look at other major military platforms for % of "foreign" content.

Griz,

Are you okay with it if, say, the UK or Australia or Japan, or South Korea, or one of the dozens of other countries who are buying billions of dollars worth of our military hardware, demands that it all be made in their country with their workers? If other countries play by those same rules you spoke of, it will have cost us thousands of jobs.

ID -- Let’s tell ‘em we wanna see a First Article, huh?

Your idea is not crazy – but if it was not one of the criteria it still does not mean the selection that was made is the wrong one for shady reasons, it may just mean the criteria were not all that they should have been. I don’t think this is one of Boeing’s arguments, is it?

Ok just a little info In was told I could pass along.
KC-45A Tanker Fact Sheet

The KC-45A competition was fair and the best team won:

The KC-45A competition underwent the most rigorous, fair and transparent acquisition process in Department of Defense history.
The Air Force went to unprecedented lengths to make sure both companies were kept fully informed about all requirements and the status of their respective bids.
Size of the proposed tanker was not dictated by the Air Force nor was size an established criteria. Each contractor was free to propose the best solution and platform to meet Air Force warfighter requirements.
Northrop Grumman did better analysis and developed a better solution than its competition.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A is good for America's industrial base:

The Northrop Grumman KC-45A tanker program will create a new aerospace manufacturing corridor in the southeastern United States thereby broadening and strengthening the U.S. aerospace industry.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A tanker will support more than 25,000 direct and indirect jobs in the United States—a conservative estimate based upon the U.S. Department of Commerce aerospace industry jobs projection formula.
Using more recent data from our suppliers and applying the Labor Department’s formula for projecting aerospace jobs at the state and regional level, the KC-45A will employ approximately 48,000 direct and indirect jobs nationwide.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A U.S. supplier base includes 230 companies in 49 states.
Assembly and militarization of the Northrop Grumman KC-45A tanker will take place in Mobile, Ala., resulting in the creation of 2,000 jobs.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A tanker program does not transfer any jobs from the United States to France or any other foreign country.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A is vitally important to the U.S. Air Force:

Air refueling tankers are a vital component to national security.
The existing fleet of Eisenhower-era KC-135s is older than any other force element currently in the U.S. Air Force inventory.
The U.S. Air Force established the KC-135 aerial refueling tanker replacement program as its number one acquisition priority. We simply cannot expect our airmen to forever defend our national interests with aging aircraft.
"From deploying and employing American combat power from all the services rapidly anywhere in the world, to providing disaster relief and humanitarian supplies around the globe, these tankers will provide the air bridge for the United States to defend our national interest and assist our friends anywhere on the planet," -- U.S. Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne.
"Recapitalization of our Air Force's jet tanker inventory is long overdue. Air refuelers are a single point of failure in modern military operations. Across the spectrum of what we do, we absolutely rely on the capabilities they give to us," -- U.S. Air Force Vice Chief of Staff
Gen. Duncan McNabb.
Northrop Grumman KC-45A is ready now:

The first Northrop Grumman KC-45A tanker aircraft was built and flown in September 2007.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A Aerial Refueling Boom System has completed 73 test flights totaling more than 200 flight hours. The boom completed the first in-flight fuel transfer on Feb. 29, 2008.
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A is based upon the Royal Australian Air Force KC-30B Multi-role Tanker, which has been built, flown and tested. It will be delivered on schedule to the Royal Australian Air Force in early 2009.
Foreign Content and Foreign Suppliers to U.S. Military Programs:

All modern jetliners are built from a global supplier base and both entrants in the KC-45A competition were no exception
The Northrop Grumman KC-45A will include approximately 60 percent U.S. content.
There are numerous examples of transatlantic cooperation on vital U.S. military programs, including the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the VH-71 Presidential helicopter and the C-27J Joint Cargo Aircraft program.
No sensitive military technology will be exported to Europe. For the KC-45A program, a commercial A330 jetliner will be assembled by American workers in EADS's facility in Mobile. The aircraft will then undergo military conversion in an adjacent Northrop Grumman facility, where all of the critical military technology will be added.

Wow! That's FOURTEEN Northrop Grummans and ONE EADSs.

It's there, you just have to read to the last paragraph to see it.


Let me guess... no link. Could that possibly have been a Pentagon news release?

"The KC-45A competition was fair and the best team won:"

Sorry did not realize you would be so anal about a linky

here you go http://www.northropgrumman.com/kc45/

I don't think you'd find any foreign parts in the B-52.

Do you work for NG?

GAO Agrees with Boeing in Air Force Tanker Contract

By Dana Hedgpeth
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 18, 2008; 2:04 PM

The Government Accountability Office has sustained a protest from Boeing on a $40 billion contract awarded to rival Northrop Grumman to build new aerial refueling tankers for the Air Force, saying "a number of significant errors" had been made in the evaluations of the heated competition.

The GAO said it recommends that the Air Force "reopen discussions with the offerors, obtain revised proposals, re-evaluate the revised proposals and make a new source selection decision." The Air Force has 60 days to tell the GAO how it will proceed.

Boeing, which built the Air Force's existing tankers, filed a protest with the agency on March 11 after it lost the deal to build 179 new refueling aircraft.

The Air Force awarded the lucrative contract, which could be worth up to $100 billion over the next two decades, to Northrop Grumman and its partner European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co., which owns Airbus, Boeing's biggest rival in the commercial aircraft business.

Boeing said in its protest that the Air Force had not fairly evaluated the technical capabilities, costs and other areas of its proposed aircraft, which is based on the 767 jetliner. The company's loss sparked an outcry from some leaders on Capitol Hill, especially those from Kansas and Washington state where Boeing has large operations. Congressional leaders have said they could withhold funds from the tanker deal if the decision is not resolved.

The GAO's 69-page decision has to be reviewed by both teams and redacted for proprietary and other sensitive information so it could take several days before the details are known, officials said.

Verrrrry interesting -- thanks, Id, I did not see that.

Air Force Faulted Over Handling Of Tanker Deal
Audit Sustains Boeing's Protest of $40 Billion Award

By Dana Hedgpeth and Robert O'Harrow Jr.
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, June 19, 2008; A01

Federal auditors said yesterday that the Air Force bungled its decision to award a multibillion-dollar contract for new refueling tankers to a team that includes the European company Airbus, touching off calls for a congressional probe and putting yet another twist in the years-long, scandal-plagued effort to replace the aging tanker fleet.

The Feb. 29 award of the $40 billion contract had spurred a fierce and unusual public relations battle between the loser Boeing, which claimed it was treated unfairly, and winner Northrop Grumman and its partner, European Aeronautic Defence and Space, parent of Airbus.

It also triggered fears that thousands of well-paying jobs in the United States would evaporate. Critics said the Air Force was being shortsighted by awarding key defense contracts to a European company, possibly hobbling the industrial might of Boeing, the nation's top airplane maker.

Yesterday's finding by the Government Accountability Office is the latest in a series of public relations debacles for the Air Force. It comes just two weeks after Air Force Secretary Michael W. Wynne and Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley were asked to resign because of "a chain of failures" in their leadership.

Critics of the award, some of whom represent states where Boeing employs thousands of people, questioned whether those resignations were linked to problems with the tanker contract. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) is among several lawmakers who said they would ask Congress to review the Air Force's decision.

"Congress needs to investigate," Cantwell said. "How is it that the process was so flawed? These mistakes are so glaring."

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), whose state is also home to major Boeing operations, called the GAO decision "a major win for Kansas and America's industrial base." Roberts said he and Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.) would introduce legislation mandating that the Air Force hold another competition.

The Air Force has 60 days to respond to the GAO findings. The service can agree or ask the GAO to reconsider. It said in a statement that it would review the decision to determine its next step.

"The Air Force will do everything we can to rapidly move forward so America receives this urgently needed capability," said Sue C. Payton, assistant secretary of acquisition for the Air Force. "The Air Force will select the best value tanker for our nation's defense while being good stewards of the taxpayer dollar."

The months-long GAO review found that the Air Force failed repeatedly to follow procedures designed to ensure a fair and open competition and good value for taxpayers. The GAO urged the Air Force to renew discussions with both teams and obtain revised proposals, and to effectively stage a new competition.

"Our review of the record led us to conclude that the Air Force had made a number of significant errors that could have affected the outcome of what was a close competition between Boeing and Northrop Grumman," said Michael R. Golden, the GAO's managing associate general counsel.

Boeing filed its protest with the agency March 11 after it lost the deal to build 179 refueling aircraft, which are essentially gas stations in the sky. The Chicago-based company is the largest U.S. aircraft manufacturer, with 44,000 jobs in the United States and operations in 40 states. It began building the Air Force's fleet of KC-135 tankers nearly 50 years ago.

In 2003, the Air Force attempted to award a contract to replace the fleet, but that effort was mishandled. After awarding a $20 billion contract to Boeing to lease tankers, the Air Force's procurement chief at the time, Darleen A. Druyun, admitted that she favored Boeing while negotiating for a job with the company. Druyun and Boeing's former chief financial officer went to prison, and Boeing agreed with the Justice Department to pay $615 million -- the biggest penalty ever paid by a defense contractor -- to settle allegations of misconduct on the tanker deal and others.

Arizona Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, had spearheaded the investigations that turned up fraud in the contract for leasing tankers and pressed the Air Force to widen the competition for a new one. Yesterday, Democrats said the GAO report showed that McCain's pressure on the Air Force was improper, and his Democratic presidential rival, Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.), called for a new competition. A McCain spokesman said in a statement that the senator's hope all along was for a fair and open process.

...

In a summary of its decision, the GAO outlined seven reasons why it sustained Boeing's protest, saying the Air Force conducted "misleading and unequal discussions with Boeing" during the process. The Air Force's evaluation of operating the aircrafts was "unreasonable," it said, noting that the service adjusted Northrop's engineering costs so that they were lower than Boeing's.

The report said that the Air Force never justified its conclusion that the proposed Northrop tanker could handle refueling all types of military planes and that the service mistakenly found that Boeing's plane was more expensive to operate and maintain when it was, in fact, cheaper.

Mike McGraw, vice president of Boeing's tanker program, said "we welcome and support today's ruling by the GAO fully sustaining the grounds of our protest."

Northrop spokesman Randy Belote said, "We continue to believe that Northrop Grumman offered the most modern and capable tanker for our men and women in uniform."

The GAO rarely sustains protests, defense analysts said, so it raises serious questions about the Air Force and its leadership.

"I cannot believe that in the most highly scrutinized procurement in the history of the United States Air Force, the GAO found so many errors," said Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.).

Even one of Northrop's strongest supporters called for an investigation of the selection process.

"Air Force officials didn't miss it by a little; they apparently missed it by a mile," said Tom Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, a nonprofit group that worked closely with Northrop on a public relations campaign defending the award. "If this is the best the Air Force can do on its most critical contract award, the system remains dysfunctional."

The GAO cited several examples of where it found problems with the tanker procurement, including how the Air Force adjusted Northrop's engineering costs so that they were lower than Boeing's. It also said the service never justified its conclusion that the proposed Northrop tanker could handle refueling all types of military planes and that the service mistakenly found that Boeing's plane was more expensive to operate and maintain when it was, in fact, cheaper.

I still can't believe they "got it wrong" the first time.